Before we bought our house in Wilson, we lived in a rental unit in Como.

After living in the small countrytown of Goomalling for nearly 7 years, I moved back to Perth to work in the South-Perth office in 1995. I found a unit nearby in Eric Street, Como. This was where I lived when Simon visited me and our romance started. This meant that he knew the area as well and we sort of agreed that when we would move in together (after his migration) we would start living in Como.

So after my return from Europe in 1997 I started looking for a house and within a few weeks found a townhouse (on Eric Street as well):

Unit 5, 29 Eric Street
Como, 6152

The area

As said is Como close to my work, but it's also close to a lot of other things: shops, restaurants (all walking distance), the freeway, the city (5 and 15 minutes driving respectively) and most importantly the river. It's so nice to be able to go for a walk (or a run) down and along the river in the evening to unwind after a hard days work.

The townhouse itself is one of 8 on the block, but only 5 of them use the driveway (with a roundabout). Because of the carports in between are the houses almost detached. The only disadvantage is that our bedroom is on the front which means that, especially in summer with the doors & windows open, you can hear all your neighbours coming and going (and some in the middle of the night).

The house

As you can see does the house have two floors. You enter straight into the living room (Simon finds this strange as all houses in the Netherlands have a -separate- hallway). When I moved in (2 weeks before Simon arrived) I saw that the previous tenants hadn't done a good job in upkeeping the house. Everything was dirty (they were smokers as well), the carpets were in bad shape and the curtains hideous. But a lot of cleaning made it look better and slowly we are making improvements. We could use my mum & dad's old curtains and I've bought a rug for on the floor.

The livingroom has a sliding door to the frontgarden, but we normally keep this (and the curtains) closed to keep the sun out. Maybe in future we will make a small terrace here (Sd: NOT !).

Through the living room you come in our combined kitchen/diningroom. Neither Simon nor I are big on cooking but between us (and various fastfood outlets) we manage. The diningroom is only really used when friends come to dinner.

The kitchen and diningroom

The first time that happened was also the first time we saw a cockroach (one of those big bush-ones). Of course it had to sit there, at that time, right on the ceiling. Fortunately my friend works in agriculture as well as brushed it off with stating the fact that cockroaches only visit a clean kitchen. We put out some bait but every now and then we see one.

The diningroom has a sliding door into the backyard. Downstairs there's also a utilityroom and a toilet. Upstairs there are 3 bedrooms, but Simon has converted one into his study. Here his precious computer is stored, our fax etc (see his IT-page). The other bedroom is for guests and of course our bedroom. All the bedrooms have built-in robes.

Our bedroom is on the front of the house. I bought new blockout curtains for the sliding door that leads to the balcony. In the afternoon the sun has moved to the back of the house and the balcony (overlooking our little courtyard) is a nice place to sit and relax.

The bathroom has a bath (in an awkward corner) and shower-cubicle and there's a separate toilet.

Outside

The carport, next to the house, easily holds 2 cars (in front of each other) but only half of it is covered. Because Simons car is newer he gets the covered spot and I have to park either behind it or in front of the house (as on the photo above). Like the interior of the house, were the front- and backyard neglected, something I couldn't bare to see. So in the frontgarden I've done some extensive weeding and used some of my old plants and some new ones to liven it up. Especially the roses are doing very well.

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